AUSTRALIA’s peak workplace health and safety body is calling for immediate government action to stop the spread of COVID-19 among healthcare workers.

An examination of current health and safety standards in healthcare by the Australian Institute of Health and Safety has found they are inadequate for the current crisis.

This comes as over 1200 Victorian healthcare workers have now tested positive to coronavirus.

AIHS chairwoman Naomi Kemp said the failure to provide adequate workplace health and safety standards in hospitals and aged care centres has contributed to the state’s devastating second wave.

“The current infection rate is unacceptable,” she said.

“But more tragically, it is preventable.”

Ms Kemp said that current health and safety practice rebuked the assumption that hospitals were some of Australia’s safest workplaces.

“Workers on many building sites currently have better protection than our healthcare workers when it comes to personal protective equipment, protocols around common work and recreation areas and transmission management,” she said.

“Despite months of preparation, hospitals and aged care centres don’t have the health and safety practices to prevent the spread of COVID-19 amongst their frontline workers.

“The rate of infection of frontline workers is putting additional pressure on the sector to be able to deliver services.”

Australia’s National Guidance on personal protective equipment use in hospitals does not require staff to wear P2/N95’s masks in all activities with confirmed or potential COVID-19 patients, even though it is an airborne virus. Surgical masks are not designed to protect the wearer.

Ms Kemp said that urgently needed to change.

“We’re not saying that individual hospitals and aged care centres aren’t trying, but many are only implementing the minimum health and safety standards, and those requirements are dangerously inadequate for frontline workers,” she said.

The AIHS is calling on the federal and state governments to implement the following:

• · Immediately upgrade federal and state infection control guidelines and standards.
• · Hospitals and aged care centres to upgrade their health and safety management plans and practices to the appropriate standard. 
• · Immediate increased surveillance and enforcement by government workplace health and safety regulatory authorities in hospitals and aged care centres.
• · Mandate the use of approved P2/N95 masks for all tasks healthcare workers perform dealing with patients suspected or confirmed to have COVID-19
• · Provide training and fit-testing in the use of masks provided to staff.

Ms Kemp said unless these five areas were addressed as a matter of urgency, infection rates in hospitals and aged care centres would continue to escalate. 

“The Victorian experience will simply be repeated in other states unless we act urgently to introduce better protocols across Australia,” she said. “No worker should have to go to work and contract COVID-19.”

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AT A PUBLIC  hearing tomorrow, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works will scrutinise a proposal from the Department of Defence to commence Phase 1 of the AIR555 facilities project at RAAF Bases in Edinburgh, Darwin, and Townsville, as well as the Territory of Cocos (Keeling) Islands.

The inquiry into the AIR 555 Phase 1 Airborne Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance Electronic Warfare Capability Facilities Works  will examine the need for and cost effectiveness of the project, along with how the project will support the incoming Peregrine capability.

Public hearing details

Date: Friday, 7 August 2020
Time: 2.15pm to 3.15pm (AEST)
Location: via teleconference

The hearing will be broadcast live at aph.gov.au/live.

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THIS WEEK the House Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs will hear from representatives from Tasmania, Western Australia, and the Australian Capital Territory as part of its inquiry into homelessness in Australia.

Chair of the Committee, Andrew Wallace MP, said the Committee was looking forward to hearing more from state and territory governments as they have primary responsibility for housing and homelessness.

"Throughout the inquiry, the Committee has heard evidence about the central role of state and territory governments in supporting those in our community who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. Last week we heard from the Northern Territory government, and this week’s hearing will be an opportunity to hear from other states and territories about their strategies to address homelessness, and how they are working with the Commonwealth under the National Housing and Homelessness Agreement," Mr Wallace said.

"The Committee will also be interested to hear more about measures implemented by state and territory governments to assist the homeless during the COVID-19 pandemic."

The Committee will also hear from community organisations including the Sacred Heart Mission and the Victorian Aboriginal Child Care Agency.

In order to ensure public safety during the COVID-19 situation, witnesses will participate in the hearing remotely, via teleconference. Interested members of the public are invited to listen to the live broadcast, available at aph.gov.au/live.

Further information, including hearing programs and submissions to the inquiry, is available on the Committee’s website.

Public hearing details

Date: Friday, 7 August 2020
Time: 8.45am to 3pm
Location: Via teleconference

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PEAK industry body, the Accommodation Association said yesterday the decision to close the Queensland border to NSW and ACT is "disappointing given there has only been a total of 21 cases in the past four weeks".

Accommodation Association CEO Dean Long said, “The Accommodation Sector agrees that health considerations must be at the forefront of decision making however this decision comes with absolutely no warning and will now mean an acceleration of job losses in Queensland’s tourism sector.

“The closing of Queensland’s border to the whole of New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory when there have been just 21 cases in total over the past month, less than one case a day, is extremely disappointing," he said.

“It is absolutely critical that we get the balance right between protecting lives and protecting jobs. The flow-on ramifications of slamming shut borders are huge.

"This decision not only costs Queensland lost revenue from tourism but the reverse applies back into New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory. This is a decision which has very real, very damaging consequences for hotels, motels and serviced apartment providers, for all those tourism and tourism-related businesses and communities and for the economies of those impacted states and territories," Mr Long said.

The Queensland Premier’s decisions impact more than just Queensland and we need a more collaborative and constructive approach.

“The Queensland Government and Chief Medical Officer must release the details of the rationale they are basing their decisions on in expanding hot spots so that businesses can understand and prepare. Decisions such as the one taken today destroy the confidence of businesses and tourism reliant communities.”

Mr Long said accommodation contributes $17 billion to the Australian economy and is essential to the Australian tourism sector’s recovery. NSW visitors contribute $4.4 billion to Queensland’s economy each year and ACT $243 million each year, according to Tourism Research Australia and Queensland visitors contribute $3.34 billion to NSW’s economy and $225 million to the ACT’s economy.

About The Accommodation Association

The Accommodation Association represents close to 3,500 hotels, over 150,000 rooms and nearly 100,000 employees across Australia. The Accommodation Association represents over 80 percent of all known accommodation providers from small regional parks, caravan parks, serviced apartments and resorts through to the largest hotel groups in the world including Accor, Hilton, Wyndam Destinations and IHG.
(https://www.aaoa.com.au/About-Us/The-Association).

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